Ward Provides Stellar Performance At Buzzer

August 29, 1986|by TED MEIXELL, The Morning Call

Sean Ward threw in a twisting, double-pump, 22-foot "Hail Mary" as the final whistle sounded last night to enable Stellar Construction to make a successful defense of the championship in its own summer basketball tournament with an exciting 58-56 victory over Ka-Mi Construction before several hundred chilly fans at the Cedar Beach Parkway Basketball Complex.

Ward's desperation heave, which hit nothing but the bottom of the net, spoiled a furious Ka-Mi comeback that whittled down a 14-point Stellar lead early in the second half to forge a tie on Jeff Ebner's 20-foot jumper with 45 seconds left.

Stellar called a pair of timeouts as the clock ran down. Mitch Schmidt missed a jumper, but Stellar retained possession out of boundswith three seconds left. After a timeout, Ward received the inbounds pass and, with 6- foot-8 veteran Eddie Mast leaping for a block, he somehow managed to get off the game-winner.

Asked what he would call his shot, Ward laughed and said, "I don't even know. Don't ask. It was sheer desperation. I saw Eddie (Mast) making a run at me. He got his hand up, and I just had to get it off any way I could. If I'd have shot it normally, if I hadn't altered it, he'd have blocked it.

If anyone had wandered by Cedar unknowingly, he'd have sworn he'd stumbled upon a battle between the Allen Alumni and the Whitehall Alumni, as both squads were dotted with former Canaries and Zephyrs. About the only guys missing were Johnny Donmoyer and Dick Tracy.

Upon closer inspection, however, one thing wasn't quite right. There was Dean Kreibel, who just graduated from Whitehall two months ago, running around with the same color jersey as Ward, Schmidt and Billy Dreisbach - Canaries all. Hey, Dean! Shouldn't you be on the other side? With Scotty Coval and Glenn Noack?

"I guess," Kreibel replied with a huge smile after accepting the tournament's Most Outstanding Player trophy (and wasn't that the ultimate irony?). I was on the opposite side. I played with those guys all summer in the Whitehall League, with Jordan 7-11."

Kreibel knocked in 12 points, including nine in the second half and five in the opening moments of the second half as Stellar blew from its 31-26 halftime lead to a whopping 42-28 bulge. He won out in the MOP voting over teammates Ward (13), Schmidt (8) and Dreisbach (14) and Ka-Mi standouts Coval (19), Mast (13), Ebner (12) and Jerry Radocha (7).

Another interesting sidelight was the sometimes head-to-head battle between the young (Kreibel) and the old (Mast). Both are 6-8 pivotmen,but the similarities end there. Kreibel, 18 and easily the youngest player on the court, will be heading to Lock Haven University next week for his freshman year. Mast, 38 and the oldest player in action, has played with the New York Knicks in the NBA and for years in the Eastern League. He also served a stint as Dieruff's head coach. The day Kreibel was born, Mast was a sophomore at Temple.

"Yeah," Kreibel said, "I was out there with a bunch of old timers." But he added that he felt the experience he picked up all summer against such seasoned competition will be invaluable to him as he launches his collegiate career. "These guys," he said, "can still play the game. You saw them."

For his part, Mast said there was no secret to being able to play with the young bucks. "You just don't stop playing," he said with a grin. "And I can still run with 'em. As you get older, you may slow down a little, but you also learn some tricks. You know, rest on offense. Take it easy when you're the fourth or fifth man on the break, things like that. But I still like to fill the lanes when I'm the third man."